The present invention relates to checkout systems and more particularly to a checkout system which can be set-up and operated at any location within the commercial establishment.
In a merchandise checkout operation, a checkout operator will move the purchased merchandise items past an optical scanner mounted within a checkout counter, the scanner scanning a coded label on the merchandise item and outputting electrical signals identifying the item. Using the data represented by the electrical signals, a data processing system coupled to the scanner will retrieve the price of the purchased merchandise item from a remote look-up table and display the price to the customer and the operator. The operator then enters the price of the item into a data terminal device which prints the necessary data on a receipt which is then given to the customer after the customer has paid for the purchased merchandise item. The receipt includes the price of each merchandise item purchased and the total cost of the items. This type of checkout operation can be very time consuming due to the length of the waiting periods in the checkout lines.